Comparison of Maritime and Road Transportations in Emissions Perspective: A Review Article

Abstract

The international maritime organization (IMO) in its attempt to avert a global environmental crisis continues to provide policies to mitigate anthropogenic emissions from the transport industry. The greenhouse gas emissions from the transport industry are relatively large, alarming, and continue to raise. Therefore, it is the focal point for the fight against global warming. This article centers on transport emissions from transportation modes with a particular focus on ocean-going vessels and road vehicles. The aim is to conduct a literature review that beams a search on emissions comparison between marine vessels and general road vehicles as a means to support a modal shift from an environmental perspective. Thus, it is aimed to create a source for future studies and to contribute to the literature. For this purpose, X articles published between 2012-2022 were reached with the keywords "ship emissions", "road emissions", "GHG emissions" and "environmental sustainability", and 7 articles focusing on ship and road transportation were filtered out of them. Obtained results support the conclusion that ships contribute relatively little to the transport emissions footprint, given the enormous volume of cargo carried. In other words, environmental sustainability can be achieved through a possible modal shift from road transport to ship transport.